


The Experience of Intimacy

by softcorevulcan



Series: A part of the world [1]
Category: Angel: the Series
Genre: Comfort, F/M, Fluff, indirect mention of major character death (Fred)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-17
Updated: 2018-10-17
Packaged: 2019-08-03 13:11:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16326887
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softcorevulcan/pseuds/softcorevulcan
Summary: “I mean as myself. In this form, as you prefer.” Her hand reached out, capturing Wesley’s wrist, holding firm. “I want to experience this.”Now, he wanted to look away. “Then find someone else to-““I want to experience this with you.”





	The Experience of Intimacy

**Author's Note:**

> This would fit any time after The Girl in Question, and before Not Fade Away. I really loved the dynamic between Illyria and Wesley in Season 5, there was so much there. If anything, this is a character study, and a commentary on the simple intimacy of connecting with someone. Also, if anyone has any Illyria/Wesley recs, please feel free to let me know.

“Illyria, no.”

A pause. She remained herself at least, blue bits and too-observant eyes. Boring into him, unrelenting in her present course.

Wesley would prefer to look away, because this should be too much right now. He did not, though.

“I mean as myself. In this form, as you prefer.” Her hand reached out, capturing Wesley’s wrist, holding firm. “I want to experience this.”

Now, he wanted to look away. “Then find someone else to-“

“I want to experience this with you.”

Those same delicate fingers that had - but they felt all wrong now, too strong, wielded too callously, a warrior's grip and purpose guiding them. Illyria pulled Wesley closer, even though the small two feet between them had already been little enough. She just held tighter when he tried to pull himself away.

Just one hand on his wrist, that was all. He was still trying to make himself look away. Her eyes never left his.

He wanted to tear away, but he was frozen. Torn within himself.

Illyria let go. He glanced down, surprised at the sudden freedom.

Her hand slipped down, almost gentle, instead toward his fingers.

She intertwined hers with his. This time, she wasn’t holding him locked. Just grasping.

Hesitant, or timid, except all of those words could not apply to her. Perhaps patient. Perhaps, testing the waters.

Waiting for Wesley to give in.

They stood like that, for a while. Wesley wanted to pull away. It felt familiar, and new, and wrong because of both of those aspects.

It felt comfortable, in a way. Not because it was like - because if it was like her, then Wesley would be too overwhelmed, too grief stricken to continue to be in this room. Maybe because, Wesley was familiar with feeling like intimate things should not feel right. They never really did feel right, all the way, until -  
  
Wesley’s breath hitched, his gaze fell to the wall, found a bit where the paint was chipping just slightly and focused himself on it. Not right now. He can’t think about what happened right now.

Illyria tilted her head, perplexed at his reaction to something internal, her presence so heavy and dominating in the room that he could tell she had moved, could tell she was looking at him in silent question, even though he refused to pull his attention from the wall.

She waited.

It seemed like Illyria could wait for however long it took. Eventually, Wesley could turn to face her again. She was still holding his hand. But enough time had passed, that he could tell the difference again, it felt nothing like Fred, anymore.

“Illyria,” his tone was warning, not that it seemed to make any difference to her. “This isn’t a good idea.”

She still had a look of curiosity about her, but if there had been a hint of concern when Wesley had broken momentarily, it was absent now. Illyria stared back at him, unafraid and indifferent towards the sharpness meeting her.

Her fingers began to move, gently. Stroking ever so slightly. Trying to emulate, maybe. That softness, of comfort people can sometimes give one another. Maybe, to try to extract that unquantifiable feeling hand holding is supposed to elicit in people who care about each other.

Wesley almost wanted to laugh. A god with the touch of a titan, trying to simulate intimacy. This was completely alien to anything Fred was, could ever be.

This was alright.

His face softened a touch, whether or not he was aware of it, as Illyria continued her exploration of what obviously eluded her.

Wesley squeezed her hand, and she froze immediately. “It’s not the doing it that makes it feel the way it does.” He gently stroked her hand, in his, tenderly. “Do you understand?”

“Why does -”

“It feels special because a person can feel the concern, the care. Not because the two people are simply touching. It’s not a matter of how to do it correctly. It’s the meaning underneath the action, that makes it - remarkable.”

She processed his words, observed him. Let herself feel them together, immersed completely in the moment, the way she often engulfed herself in her observations of particles of air or the essence of a unique plant or thing throughout her day. Now he was the unique thing, they were the worthwhile happenstance to be completely taken in, appreciated.

“I believe I see.” He did appreciate, that Illyria took her time with the things that seemed to matter to her. She gave things their proper moments, when so much of life tries to steal each precious piece into the next and the next until life has fallen apart behind you so fast there was no time to even notice the parts fracturing away.

Life was doing that to him, every day. Having Illyria around, in it, was in a way helping him to slow everything back down long enough to give at least some instances their proper time again.

They were in his apartment.

Illyria let him continue to feel, until finally he stopped stroking her hand. The moment was passed. She allowed it.

He was getting tired.

Illyria, apparently, still didn’t have what she wanted. But he wasn’t about to give her all the experiences she sought to have - she wasn’t ever going to obtain what Fred - she might be able to sense some shadow of a feeling, but it wouldn’t ever be for her.

In this form, or any other.

Illyria’s strength was back, and Wesley felt himself maneuvered toward his bed, whether he wanted to be or not. She pressed him down until he sat, then told him to lie down. Like a pet.

Wesley lurched upward, but her hand just caught hold of him and pressed him back down, until he settled on his side, near the wall, staring up at her warily. She seemed satisfied, once he stopped trying to move.

Illyria yanked the blanket up from underneath him, and he humored her well enough, just rolling unceremoniously as she did, maintaining his eye contact, then readjusting afterwards back into place, glaring.

She gave no notice, threw the blanket on top of him instead, haphazard. It would have been so funny, in another life. Wesley had half a mind to just leave it crumpled awkwardly, this might as well not be easy on her. What was the worst she would do? Throw him against the wall in a fit of frustration? Leave? Kill him? Most likely, the worst she could do was just -

Wesley suddenly realized he didn’t want her to ever die.

An irrational, abrupt thought. Not based in anything.  
  
Illyria put herself into the bed, beside him, a comfortable foot away, and pulled the blanket somewhat over herself as well. She seemed to wait for something, and Wesley took that pause to bring himself out of his unwanted thought and back into the moment. When nothing seemed to happen, Illyria reached over and quite perfunctorily resettled the blanket over Wesley, into a shape she’d no doubt noticed it tended to morph into when he laid down to sleep, during the healthier nights when heavy drinking hadn’t preceded his slumber.

He stared, mildly curious what she was aiming towards, feeling somewhat detached now to anything beyond observation himself. Maybe he was feeling some inkling of how Illyria must often experience things.

She reached out with the hand that wasn’t underneath her, and grabbed one of Wesley’s hands, to hold again.

It was so, odd.

She remained like that, completely unsure. At least, Wesley thought so. He stifled the ghost of a laugh. Illyria stared into him. She refused to ask for help, at least.

Finally, she let go again, and Wesley crossed his arms to keep them farther away from her, a pitiful effort to discourage her from touching him again. At least now they were both glowering.

And yet, Wesley felt no hostility. He didn’t think Illyria was mad at him either. Just upset that she couldn’t spark that elusive feeling she wished to experience. “Perhaps if you tried this with someone else, it might be -”

“Silence.” Illyria was nothing, if not stubborn. She could suit herself, he supposed. Wesley closed his eyes, decided to ignore whatever it was she was after. It was apparent she wasn’t going to let him get up, or replace him during this experiment, so he might as well just detach.

Wesley thought he heard a sigh. It could have been the heater kicking on.

“Wesley.”

“Yes?”

He felt his body pulled forward, his head against Illyria’s shoulder, free arm yanked to her side. Wesley opened his eyes. “What are you trying to do?”

She looked just as perplexed as he felt. “Feel it, again. I don’t understand why this isn’t triggering the appropriate reactions.”

Wesley wanted to laugh again. He pushed himself up a bit, free to do so now, and tried to understand her. “Again, just because two people touch, does not mean they will feel connected.”

“You are speaking vaguely, you are not clarifying the issue.”

“No, I suppose I’m not.” He let himself stroke her side, placatingly. That was the feeling she was after, or some small part of whatever feeling she was really aiming for. That feeling that was special, that she couldn’t really have, that no one else could really ever have from him, except for -

He had to stop, the body still felt too the same. Like when she had worn leather coats, and he’d held her close.

Illyria wore frustration frequently. “Yet you create the feeling so easily. I cannot do the same. There must be some way.”

Wesley shrugged, allowed Illyria to have him close to her for a bit longer.

“Continue holding me,” she commanded, curling closer now, trying to lean into his shoulder, hold him around his side. This, thankfully, was quite foreign to the feel of lovers before. Strength tightly coiled up, an atomic bomb before nuclei are split, wrapping around him and holding tight. Curious.

She was not, ultimately, satisfied with the arrangement. After humoring the position for several minutes, she thrust herself away from him, of which he was happy to comply. Wesley watched her, wondered if he really had any idea what emotions her face truly conveyed, of how much she felt under there at all. Did Gods have different emotions all together, he mused, and, would he even be able to understand a portion of them?

“I am unsatisfied.” Like a petulant child.

“Apparently.”

Illyria was still baffled. Wesley for the life of him didn’t know what she thought the ideal situation right now was supposed to be. He wasn’t going to be her lover. She probably couldn’t love. And anyway, she didn’t actually seem to be after either of those things.

He shrugged, gave her a bit more time to act impulsively, then rolled over to face the wall. He might as well sleep, its not like Illyria wouldn’t wake him up if she wanted him.

It was surprisingly easy to get close to drifting, to feel the lull of exhaustion and feel safe enough to fall toward it. Despite there being a god right beside him, unobserved and characteristically erratic. In all likelihood, dangerous.  
  
But it still felt comfortable.

Before he could fall all the way, he felt another abrupt shift, bringing him back to some alertness.

It was Illyria, moving behind him, wrapping herself around him and holding. After a small period of adjustment, it felt softer.

More like a human being, one of her hands lightly ghosting across his stomach, his side, an echo of his comforting touch on her hand earlier, on her side earlier. So she had learned something.

It still felt distinctly Illyria. Too firm, too precise, presence so large it was impossible to be unaware that the touch belonged to a being that could rip through him instead, if the touch were to morph.

He leaned back into her. It felt comfortable.

“Is this what you wanted?”

“This is something.”


End file.
